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Shia LaBeouf Accused of Plagiarizing His Freestyle Rap

By Jackie Willis 6:51 AM PDT, June 30, 2015

YouTube

Shia LaBeouf is being accused yet again for stealing someone else's words.

Over the weekend, a video went viral showing the Transformers actor freestyle rapping to an impromptu audience. After seeing the performance, Pri the Honeydark -- a MC and music producer that is part of a hip-hop collective called the Anomalies --claimed on Instagram that LaBeouf took his rap from her group's 1999 song, "Perfectionist."

"You can't rip songs from my Anomalies crew, recite them in freestyle as your own, then not expect to be called out by ACTUAL MCs!" she wrote. "This is straight disrespect to lyricism."

According to reports, Pri the Honeydark may have a reason to be mad if you listen carefully to LaBeouf and the Anomalies' lyrics. The line "rare commodity, the quality is what it’s got to be, and my philosophy is much farther than what your eyes can see," is recited by both LaBeouf and the rap group.

That being said, at no point in the video does LaBeouf claim to be spitting original rhymes.

But this wouldn't be the first time he's been accused of stealing material. Back in 2013, LaBeouf's short film Howard Cantour was noticeably similar to that of a comic titled Justin M. Damiano, written and created by Daniel Clowes.

"Copying isn't particularly creative work. Being inspired by someone else's idea to produce something new and different IS creative work," he tweeted of the plagiarism allegations. "I'm embarrassed that I failed to credit @danielclowes for his original graphic novella Justin M. Damiano, which served as my inspiration."